


Caged

by butterflycollective



Category: Matt Houston (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: Español
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-11
Updated: 2020-10-11
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:47:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 23,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26944654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/butterflycollective/pseuds/butterflycollective
Summary: Borrowing from the show's characters just for fun.Based on the episode Caged from the third season, told from different points of view





	1. Chapter 1

C.J. got dressed in one of her business lawyerly suits and finished by styling her hair inside the bathroom at the hotel in Santa Fe. But she wasn't the one trying the case that would play out inside a courtroom across town. She'd be sitting in the witness box while other lawyers interrogated her. One to help her tell her story of what had happened to her last year, the other to rip her story apart and paint her as the worst kind of whore.

But she'd had enough time spent handling criminal law cases including while interning for F Lee Bailey. Sure she'd focused more on corporate law lately

"You almost ready to go…?"

She looked over at Matt who stood waiting in the bedroom. He'd go down with her and sit in the audience during the trial. He'd testified about an hour the day earlier, not long after they'd flown in from Los Angeles to put this chapter of their lives behind them.

Today would be her turn to take the hot seat and she anticipated spending most of the day there until they were finished with her.

She put on the final touches of mascara and then she went out to meet him.

"I'm ready Houston…"

He smiled at her, his brown eyes reassuring her and slid his arm around her waist.

"Let's go then okay?"

She nodded as they left the hotel room to head to the courthouse. After waiting in the witness prep room, she'd be called in by the bailiff who'd lead her to the witness stand where after raising her hand and taking the oath, she'd begin to tell her story.

As she remembered it.

18 months earlier….

Sheriff Butz:

I drove the latest shipment of gals to Piser's ranch and his latest political friends already had started drinking when we arrived. One of the deputy's herded them out of the jail van, about a half dozen girls of all different types dressed in skimpy bikinis. After all, Semour Piser who chaired the state's parole board lived in a fancy estate with a swimming pool and he hosted the parties himself.

Piser studied the women with a critical eye while I stood next to him.

"Party time girls…"

They didn't look too thrilled but they'd act the parts. We'd had trouble with some of the earlier ones going all defiant, resisting the johns and trying to escape. So we'd made examples of them and I promised Piser each time that the next crop of party girls would be better.

This time I knew that he'd be pleased. We had a couple sexy looking blondes including one in Daisy Duke shorts and a nice fluffy redheaded girl. The only one missing was Fran, the most belligerent one of the bunch, a real wildcat. Piser hadn't cared to see her again so she remained back in lockup at the detention center.

But Piser didn't look happy at all. He wanted some high class girl and face it, not too many of them wandered into the remote desert town where we picked them up. Alley cats at best, most of them turned out to be but for the most part, the politicians from the capitol weren't disappointed.

"I'd like to have a party with you Womart…"

That'd be the redhead in the red bikini and Fran's partner in crime. She always gave lip but the men liked her and that kept her alive.

The deputy sneered.

"You couldn't stand the pace."

But she'd already left not without a parting shot.

"Boredom kills…"

The deputy just looked at me but I shook my head. One of the state senators had picked her photo out of a lineup and so there'd be no teaching her a lesson today. They liked their women unmarked like brand new merchandise even though they were some thrift store version of a whore.

The women all in skimpy outfits lined up and posed for the men who'd already made their choices. I smiled and strutted a little for Piser.

"We got us a real good bunch this time."

Piser just looked bored.

"That's what you said the last time."

Womart piped up.

"Oh we took care of the girls who caused trouble."

I interjected eager to erase the frown on Piser's face.

"We made examples out of them Mr. Piser. That will not happen again."

I and Womart had made sure of that, put bullets in the head of the ones who made trouble and buried them in the desert where no one would find them. We had a business to run after all, we handled the messy part of it so Piser could keep his hands clean. He should be grateful but he controlled the show…along with a new partner he had brought into it.

Then damn it if the blond with the Daisy Dukes on, Carrie I think her name was, took off in a sprint towards the gate.

"Get her…"

Damn girls got so excited when Carrie took off and started cheering her escape on as if she weren't winning of the race for her miserable life. That's why we couldn't let the ones who couldn't be controlled live after trying to fight back or escape. After we caught her, I'd have Romart pull the trigger and get rid of the body and the women already knew they'd never see her again.

But Carrie was quick; she'd gotten the jump on my men and made it down the steps to the fence before Womart picked her up kicking and screaming.

I and my other deputy herded the girls toward the pool area.

"Come on girls you know what you're here for now go make the gentlemen happy."

A couple sassed back but they did what they were told. They knew by now what would happen to them if they didn't.

The defiant redhead who they called Babs resisted a bit.

"All right you don't have to push…"

She hadn't been completely trained yet but she'd get there. Damn Carrie for embarrassing me with her stunt in front of Piser. It'd be the last thing she ever did but Piser needed some reassuring.

"Oh don't worry we'll take care of her."

Womart tossed her inside the van and closed the doors before driving off to take Carrie on the last ride of her sorry life.

She had her choice, she'd make it and now she'd pay.

C.J. Parsons:

Houston just worries too dang much about me. Not that I don't like it but when he'd said goodbye to me just two days ago he'd given me a list of instructions that would frustrate a girl scout.

Damn it was hot as I drove my convertible with the top down surrounded by desert in all directions. That's all I saw was endless desert, more cacti of different types and tumbleweed on the road than I can ever remember. But then Houston told me it'd just be 800 miles of desert and he'd been about right but I had to get to Santa Fe to take one deposition and since I'd been working so hard lately, I decided to spend some vacation time by taking a road trip instead of just flying there.

It'd been great to get away for a while and last night I'd spent the night at a hotel in Phoenix, dutifully called Houston to tell him I'd arrived safely before he could call me and then went out to dinner with some old friends from college.

This morning I got up bright and early hoping to make good time but now I wasn't sure where I was heading. Had I taken the right turn 30 miles ago at the exchange? Now I felt confused.

The latest sign that flew by put me in some place called Bannon County but I wouldn't be staying. I had to hit some town where I'd be staying in a hotel later that night and by then I'd be ready to crash after getting something to eat.

The scenery didn't look familiar to me so I pulled up one of the roadmaps to take another work while keeping one eye on the road. It'd been pretty deserted for a while now and I saw some semi truck in the distance coming towards me after it crossed some railroad tracks.

I must have looked at my watch too because I was pressed for time having overslept that morning and then stopping at a roadside café for a nice lunch. I wanted to make it to my next stop while it was still daylight.

I picked up the map again keeping one eye on the truck looking to make sure I was getting closer. I didn't see the station wagon alongside it in my lane until it was too late.

But when I did I swerved sharply to the right as hard as I could and then the car flew in the air over the dirt and when it landed, I was thrown forward and hit my head on the steering wheel.

I don't remember much after that.

Matt Houston:

I hit the suite after a business meeting with Cynthia who owned a company that did business with Houston Enterprises. Now I spent most of my time investigating cases with C.J. and my Uncle Roy but Murray wanted me to handle one small deal for him and that's how I met Cynthia. We'd been going out for a week, finding that mixing business and pleasure suited both of us.

She was really something…vivacious, smart and cut a mean figure in her business suits. I'd wanted to see how she looked more casual so I'd invited her to go sailing this morning in the Santa Monica bay and then afterward, we headed to my place to change.

She came up the staircase, dressed up in a nice orange dress that molded to her figure.

"That was fast."

She walked towards me.

"Quick changes are one of my specialties."

"Remind me to time you next time….Why don't we try this new place for lunch down the street?"

She sat on a stool next to me.

"Oh great I'm famished."

But my mind was on the slip of paper in my hand and the telephone on the wet bar. C.J. had given me the phone numbers of everywhere she'd be staying on this road trip of hers. I punched numbers on the phone to call the hotel in Santa Fe where she should be right now. I just wanted to make sure she made it safely, that's all. Then Cynthia and I would head on out to spend the afternoon together.

"I want to make one phone call…"

She put her chin in her hand. I thought she'd roll her eyes but she didn't…still she'd seen me reach for the phone enough in the past couple of day. But C.J. was my best friend in the whole world since we grew up as kids in Texas and sometimes I felt I needed to look after her. After all, it hadn't been that long ago she'd been shot on one of our cases and came closer to dying than had ever scared me before…she'd gotten well, headed off to Hawaii for a month and came back fully recovered.

Sometimes my friendship with C.J. proved difficult to explain to the other women in my life. This was one of them. But Cynthia had been a good sport about it.

"C.J… Houston she only left for Santa Fe two days ago."

"Well I know that and it's…yeah C.J. Parsons' suite please."

I waited as Cynthia sighed behind me.

"She's a big girl Houston."

"Hadn't checked in…she really should have been there hours ago…well…no…listen I'll call back later thank you."

I put the phone down and went to embrace Cynthia.

"Ah you're right she's a big girl…"

Soon our hands were on each other. I gestured with my head.

"Let's go…"

I held her hand as she led me to the door but not before I grabbed up that slip of paper. I don't know why I did that. Something…no I knew it was nothing. C.J. was having a great time on her road trip and could have stopped somewhere along the way. When I returned I knew there'd be a message from her on my voice mail.

C.J.:

I woke up and the car was on fire, smoldering. I lay down on the dirt, aching all over but mostly on my head. As I lifted my head up, I saw this bunny scampering into the brush. But then…my head hurt so much and I wanted to get up but it was so hard…I felt dizzy and disoriented…my mind fuzzy. I watched the car burn, had I driven it? What was it doing there? What was I doing here? Where was here?

Who was I?

God, my head throbbed and my mind, like a deep fog shrouded it. I tried to make sense of it as my mind raced. Nothing looked familiar at all and yet I headed back on the road waving my arms for someone to help me but the few cars just sped on by without stopping. I touched my face and felt a bump there and more dizziness but I kept walking. I had to keep walking but didn't know where to go so I just followed the highway.

Soon it'd be getting dark and before long it did…as I reached the town without a name. I walked inside a bar to do what…maybe use a phone though I didn't know who to call. Inside there was a red headed woman sitting at the bar with the bar tender, a man. They both looked at me.

"Not my style…,"she said.

"Evening sweet thing," the bartender said, "What's your pleasure?"

I had no idea. What did he mean by that and why were they looking at me so strangely?

"Have a little fight with your boyfriend?"

He pulled at his belt and I just stood there still trying to make sense of it all. That just seemed to encourage him to be more…friendly.

"Well now, I think I got a cure for whatever's ailing you…"

The woman walked over to me.

"You hurt?"

What did she mean by that? I had hit my head but the pain came and went. The aches in my body had receded.

"No…"

She rested a hand on my back to guide me toward the bar.

"You look wrecked. You'd better sit down."

I didn't know what to do. She seemed nice but who was she? Did I know her? Why was she helping me? All these questions and then the bartender smirked.

"I got a cot in the back…"

I didn't like the way he said that. I don't think he wanted to help me like the woman. She shot him a glance that meant she didn't like it.

"Why don't you take a hike?"

The bartender put his hands up.

"Just trying to give her a little comfort…"

I didn't need any comfort. I needed to know my name. I needed to know why I was there. Images flickered inside my head…random… horses…buildings…and a man but nothing stayed for long.

The woman sat down at the bar.

"Got a name honey?"

I had no idea. I must have one right but nothing came to me.

"Where you from…?"

I just drew another blank. I seemed to be doing that a lot but then somewhere in the fuzziness an image appeared of a…bunny. I tried to grab hold of it because it's all that appeared.

"There was a… bunny…"

The woman sipped her drink, nodding.

"Bunny…nice name…"

But that didn't sound right to me. Nothing else came to mind to replace it.

"So what's your story…"

Story what story? Oh yeah, my life but I couldn't remember any of it. Just waking up and seeing the burning car and the bunny. Some fleeting images that were scrambled inside my head giving me a headache…none of them made sense.

But the woman waited for an answer so I gave one.

"I'm not sure I have one."

"Oh you got one, maybe a few pages are missing but I know a classy broad when I see one…Now this jacket may be a little beat up but it's good material…and that watch aint from a thrift store either."

I looked down at my jacket and my paints that had dirt on them. I don't remember putting them on and where I'd gotten them. I didn't remember where I'd been that morning or all the days preceding it. I looked at my watch, not recognizing it or where it came from…who gave it to me? Someone did at some point.

The bartender shook his head.

"She looks like she's been on one hell of a bender."

The woman shot him a look that I caught.

"Been on a few myself. You even know where you are."

I had no idea.

"No…"

My head hurt and I winced as I touched it.

"Well I do…and believe me it aint worth knowing…It looks like someone really got you good. Let's get you fixed up."

She led me away to a washroom. I didn't know if someone had hit me and that's why my head hurt. The accident…had I hit my head? Had I been alone in the car?

I washed myself up, being careful of the bruised area on my forehead and the reflection in the mirror could have been anyone. I don't know her…but she's me. Where was she born, what about her parents? What did she do, why was she here? To me, she just looked like another stranger but when her hands moved mine did. When I frowned, the lines appeared on her face. I touched my cheek and so did she.

If the woman thought it was strange, she didn't say anything.

"Jake…he's the bartender," she said, "I don't trust him. Maybe we better get on out of here."

I just furrowed my brows at her. I didn't know her yet she seemed intent on helping me. I felt grateful but deep inside somewhere I felt wariness too.

Be careful who you trust. Don't take everything at face value.

Those lessons had been drilled inside me by someone but who? Was it the man that flickered in front of my face sometimes before vanishing as if he were a mirage?

"I'm Rhonda by the way…"

I just nodded unable to say who I was in response.

"You ready to go?"

I nodded again, suddenly I felt like I wanted to leave too. But as we returned in the bar Jake just stared at us and something in his eyes made me deeply afraid.


	2. Chapter 2

Present Day:

Matt drove to the courthouse while she just tried to relax before having to go on the witness stand in the criminal trial of Semour Piser. It's not like she had never testified before but this time the story she'd tell arose from when she'd been someone else. A woman with no past who started with a blank slate and it had taken her some time to merge those two lives into one.

"We're going to stop and get some breakfast okay?"

"It'll have to be drive thru because we're running late."

She hadn't eaten anything this morning even though she'd been hungry. After skipping breakfast for a while and making it up at lunch, she'd been glad to enjoy her mainstays of eggs and toast again.

"All right but we'll make up for it at lunch."

She nodded.

"I don't know how much time I'll have left on the stand. It could take all day."

He turned into another street.

"Okay then we'll go out to a steak dinner with all the trimmings."

She smiled at him then.

"Steak will be great…"

They'd been to Santa Fe several times since what had happened. She'd had to testify in the preliminary hearing to push the case to its trial date.

"I'm here to take care of you okay? Anything you want or need…"

She nodded grateful for that and for all the blessings she'd been given in the past two years.

"Thanks Houston…."

They hit the drive thru and left with some egg and steak burritos and orange juice. She missed her coffee but the juice hit the spot and her meal would get her through until lunch. What lay ahead made her both nervous and relieved…she didn't like reliving one of her most painful experiences but at least with her testimony she'd put it behind her and hopefully help put Piser away for good.

Now all she had to do was get through it…

About 18 months ago…

Sheriff Butz:

Most people tell me I'm the best sheriff Bannon County ever elected and that I look the part too. I fit the uniform just right and after just a year in office, I lowered the crime rate by about 50% and people feel safe on the streets. I have my deputies clean up all the riff raff, women soliciting for tricks, people ripping off old ladies and vandalizing store fronts. My backers including those at the capitol say if I continue to this well, I'll get reelected for sure.

I had a busy day and back in my office I was combing my hair so I'd look nice just in case anyone saw me eating at the diner later on. Ever since I broke off with Lorena because she wanted to get too serious, I've been quite the ladies' man about town.

The phone rang and that just irritated me. Didn't everyone know I was going off the clock? I put my comb away and went to pick it up.

"Yeah…"

Damn if it didn't turn out to be Jake hanging out at his job at the bar. He called me regular if he had anything that might interest me. But right now, all I wanted was a good meal in my stomach and a willing woman in my bed tonight. You'd be amazed at how the uniform and badge drew women like flies.

"Listen, I got some real cupcakes down here. Think you're really going to like them."

That perked my interest because I remembered how Piser had gotten on me about not finding good enough girls for his parties. They'd been pretty enough for alley cats but they had a thing for trying to run away. Making a few of them examples hadn't cured the rest of them yet.

"Uh the place pretty empty…?"

"Yeah."

I knew what to do next. I'd done it so many times already.

"Good. I'm on my way."

Because he and I had an arrangement and both made out well with it. Those two cupcakes as he called them were as good as mine.

Matt:

I had my arms all wrapped up around Cynthia as we made out on my couch at the office. Lunch had turned to an afternoon spent walking on the marina and then led to dinner at a restaurant overlooking the harbor.

Then of course back to my office where we kissed when we weren't looking at each other, both wanting to spend the night together…nothing serious.

"Oooh you're something else you know that?"

One of my smoother lines but I meant it. The woman knew how to treat a guy and I knew if I played my cards right and I'd played them so often before, we'd wind up in the bedroom downstairs soon enough. She looked back at me totally getting into it but then….it hit me again. I had a phone call to make. I'd been making them all afternoon during lunch, while we'd been at the marina and at the restaurant and now back at the office. All had gone unanswered except for a polite voice telling me that no, either C.J. hadn't checked in the hotel yet or since the last time I'd called. As much as I wanted to end this night just right with Cynthia, I couldn't stop thinking…about C.J. Where the hell was she anyway and why hadn't she called?

Cynthia was about to kiss me again when I put my hand up.

"Hold the thought for a minute….I'm going to try Santa Fe one more time."

It was always one more time I'd promised her, when we were walking hand in hand, toasting each other with wine with our steak and now just before we were heading downstairs. But I knew I had to keep Cynthia happy so I told her why as I made my way out of her arms and towards the phone while she watched.

"I mean…I told her to fly but no she wanted to drive hmm….see the scenery. 800 miles of desert…some scenery…"

I'd already dialed the phone and glanced back at Cynthia.

"Wanted to mix business with pleasure…"

She looked miffed putting her chin in one hand.

"Never works."

"Yes C.J. Parsons checked in yet…She does have a reservation doesn't she…and you haven't heard from her…Yeah minute she comes in have her call me….Matt Houston. She's got my number."

Cynthia had gotten off the couch, her romantic mood completely dissipated.

"I got your number too Houston…ciao."

She chucked me on the chin and headed on out of there leaving me knowing I'd get no action tonight. But I didn't get it, all I wanted to do was to make sure my friend had made it safely to her hotel, what was the big deal about that? Why did Cynthia have to freeze me out?

Why did all my girlfriends have a problem with my relationship with C.J.?

C.J.

I came out of the washroom with Rhonda, looking much better. My head still hurt but not as much. I didn't feel much like hungry but I knew I'd been running on empty all day.

Without knowing who I was, I just felt frozen in place, unsure what to do next. I kept searching and searching inside myself to find something, anything familiar. Anything that made sense since I didn't see it in my surroundings at all…

But when I saw Jake again, the way he looked at Rhonda and me. I knew something had changed.

Rhonda acted as if was normal walking back to the bar while I slowed down my pace, looking around me, sensing that it didn't feel right.

"I know how you must feel hon. I've seen the downside of more two-stop towns than you could imagine. I've had my share of forgotten weeks too."

She put something back in her purse. Jake watched. I didn't know why he watched so intently but it made my neck prickle.

"It'll come back to you."

I wrapped my arms around myself.

"I hope so. I don't know what I'm going to do if it doesn't."

I really didn't because how would I even begin to start knowing how to live without knowing my name or anything else? I couldn't even remember how long I'd been like this and what I'd done to survive. Nothing existed for me except when I woke up next to the burning car.

Rhonda took the practical route as if she'd decided to take care of me. I didn't know why, I just didn't know what else to do.

"Well first thing we got to do is get you something to eat."

I shook my head.

"I'm really not that hungry."

She just looked at me as if I were crazy. Was I crazy?

"You've been walking all day from the looks of it and I doubt you had lunch out there."

Rhonda pointed towards the door.

"I saw a diner down the street."

She grabbed her purse as if she were used to taking charge.

"Well come on…I'm buying."

I hesitated.

"I wish there was something I could do to repay you."

She didn't seem worried.

"Plenty of time to do that later hon. I'm looking forward to meeting some of your classy friends…"

So there was a catch but that made me feel better about it. She helped me now and I repay her later, which made sense when little else did. If she were right about me and I had classy friends, then I had something she wanted.

I didn't see any friends or any faces…except one of a man but it was fleeting. I couldn't hold onto him anymore than anything else.

We started heading towards the door but then saw a burly man dressed in a police uniform. He acted friendly but his eyes…something very different. He had another guy in the same uniform with him.

"Well well…good evening…you ladies going somewhere?"

Rhonda just stared at him. I didn't know what to do so I did the same.

"Yeah…dinner. Is there a law against that around here?"

I guessed she had this conversation before in her life. So did the officer.

"Oh no what I got was a call that you two girls were soliciting in this fine establishment."

Now I knew he wasn't here being friendly. I saw that Jake was trying very hard not to look at us. Rhonda looked ticked off as she looked at me then back at him.

"You got to be kidding…"

"I'm not a man who does very much kidding."

He gestured for the other man to do something and that's when I felt afraid. I didn't know what fear was really or didn't remember beyond feeling my neck prickle or from wondering if I'd ever find out my name. But as I saw Rhonda shove the smaller one back, I knew enough to run.

I had to escape, but where to go?

The two men collided and together hit the wall by the main door blocking it. That left the door just off the washroom into an alley. I ran towards it but Jake sprung into action grabbing my arm before I made it to the doorway. I felt terrified when he did that. I screamed and I fought him, pulling away from where he held me but he was strong. He knew how to keep me from escaping. The burly officer walked towards me and I still tried to get away crying out.

What was happening, why were they trying to hurt me? Was there a reason? Had I done something I didn't remember or…

The bigger guy grabbed me from Jake barking at me to come on and I didn't want to but he was much stronger and I saw the other officer dragging in Rhonda who kicked and struggled against him.

"Let go of me," she yelled.

But neither of us could get away. They pulled us towards the door to take us outside and still I fought, making him drag me across the threshold.

They handcuffed us in back, tightly so my hands hurt and then just tingled and dumped us in the van on the seats. We drove for a while and then they stopped, pulling us out to lead us into a building. I stumbled as I walked and they picked me up. Two deputies removed our cuffs while the burly one who they called Sheriff Butz just watched.

He walked us past the showers and a couple of rooms with glass on the doors where women were inside and then he found an empty one. After unlocking the door, he pushed us inside and I just stood pressing my back against the wall trying to be invisible. I didn't understand this crazy world where things could change so fast. Not too long ago, Rhonda and I were talking in a bar and the next…dragged out to be brought here.

But why? Butz and the other one hadn't said anything to us. They just talked about someone named Piser who would be happy to see us. We were the best ones yet whatever that meant. I didn't know if I wanted to find out.

All I knew how to do was to be quiet, to just watch and run if I had to…run faster to get away. But for now, I'd just wait.

Until I had a chance to run.

Chris:

"Chris you just stay here for the rest of the night in case she calls…what's the latest word from the hotel?"

He sounded more worried as me. I mean he hadn't heard back from C.J. all day and here he was with his bag packed and ready to go off after her. Maybe she got delayed or she met up with some friends and lost track of the time. I didn't think anything bad had happened to her. I mean the lady knew how to take care of herself and had survived jilted stalkers and gunshot wounds for god's sake.

But my boss asked a question and awaited my answer.

"She still hasn't checked in and nobody's heard from her."

He sighed not liking that answer one bit. Yeah I know they're business partners going way back and best friends back even further but don't tell me that's all there is to it. I know that underneath it all they're hot for each other and when they finally realize that, someone in the office will be a few bucks richer after winning the betting pool.

"Something's wrong, I know it and I'm going to find her."

I just looked at him as we walked to the helipad. He really was scared something had happened to her. What was more likely is that he'd run into her at the hotel in Santa Fe. She'd apologize for not phoning in and if either of them has any sense at all, they'd head up to that suite she reserved and make good use of it. Still since he was upset I had to approach him rationally.

"Houston, it's the middle of the night. Don't you think maybe you ought to wait until the morning?"

No interest from him on doing that.

"No…I want you to get me the first flight to Phoenix. That's the last place that we know she was."

I was resigned.

"I'll have a car waiting."

Just like that he was in my copter and on my way to the airport. I didn't want to see him or C.J. again until they had both come to their senses and as long as they did it by the end of the month, I still had a chance to collect.

Until then, I thought I'd order up some pizza. It was going to be a long night.

Present Day:

Matt and C.J. entered the courthouse and went to meet up with the prosecutor outside the trial courtroom. The hallway was crowded with lawyers and other people but appeared orderly.

He held her hand as he had since they left the car.

"I guess I'd better go," she said, "I'll see you inside."

"I'll be sitting up front," he said, "You get lost or upset with what one of them says, you look at me."

She paused and then nodded.

"It's going to be just fine," he said, "It won't undo what happened to you but this is your chance to say it to a jury. I know you can do it."

She nodded.

"I got to do it for the women who can't...like Carrie. I promised."

He hugged her tightly and she smiled in his embrace. She knew she could handle it if she could get past the first couple of minutes, the time when the judge explained the routine to her, the instructions to the jury and the clerk swearing her in to testify.

Once she started telling her story, their story...she knew she'd keep going until it was time to finish it.

"I'll see you later Houston..."

He watched her walk away as proud of her as he'd ever been.


	3. Chapter 3

Present Day

C.J. sat outside in a hallway after hearing from the bailiff there would be a delay in her testimony. Another witness had been called to the stand ahead of her and so she'd been sent to the hallway to wait. Matt had gone to make some business calls before he'd head into the courtroom to sit in the audience. He'd already been given permission by the courts after the judge ruled that listening to the case wouldn't taint his own testimony if he was called to the stand to deliver it. The men on trial had been charged with kidnapping and attempted murder charges in connection to him.

She wished he were with her right now as she tried to mentally prepare herself for her time on the witness stand. Could be a couple of hours, could be all day depending on how much cross-examination the other side wanted to do. Four attorneys had their chance to take their crack at her and she knew that even with the prepping, she'd have to work to keep her focus on her recollections and her words rather than the feelings that they elicited inside her even over a year later. The breakfast she ate filled her up, she'd been so glad that her stomach had handled it much better than she thought.

Marie walked out of the courtroom and smiled at her.

"It shouldn't be too much longer," she said, "They wanted to get done with one of the other girls because her mother's in the hospital back in Ohio."

C.J. nodded.

"It's all right," she said, "How's it going?"

Marie looked thoughtful.

"Better than expected," she said, "the judge is granting our objections and the defense is not happy about that."

C.J. shrugged.

"Goes with the territory," she said, "Been on the good and bad sides of judges myself."

"Well, let's hope it keeps up," she said, "though we have a strong case without any help."

C.J. knew that as a lawyer having survived the preliminary hearing already which had been done not long after Matt's engagement to Elizabeth had broken up.

She'd make it through the trial too, one question and one answer at a time.

Earlier…

C.J.:

I looked around me as the deputy who had grabbed my arm pulled me down the hall. I wanted to fight back but something told me not to resist. Another deputy had taken Rhonda out ahead of me and I had lost sight of her.

She'd been inside the cell sitting on the lower bunk in the spartan cell, looking up as the deputy pushed me into the cell and then slammed the door behind me. I was trapped inside a box, with only a barred window to look out into the darkness. I just pressed my back against a wall, standing rigid, trying to make myself smaller and invisible like I had when I'd been a little girl and something scared me. I don't know how I knew that but I did.

"Nice digs huh," Rhonda said, "though I've seen worse."

I just stared at her my heart still beating fast in my chest. Dizziness filled me as my back slid down the wall, my legs bent and I sat on the floor. The walls seemed to close in on me.

"They'll just hold us for two days," she said, "They have to take us to the judge by that time."

I heard the bemusement in her voice as if she'd been through this so many times. She didn't seem to feel the fear that laced through me even as I tried to stop it. Had I been through this before, been handcuffed and thrown into a jail cell? It didn't feel familiar to me but then nothing did since I woke up without a past.

"I wonder what they want with us."

That was all l could think of saying because I knew the men hadn't grabbed us from the bar and brought us here for no reason.

"They'll take us to court in a day or so like I said. We just have to sit and chill out here until then. Three hots and a cot, it's called."

"Three what?"

Rhonda chuckled ruefully.

"You must have had a quiet life," she said, "it's called being fed and sheltered by the state, beats the cost of a hotel. Except for being locked up behind bars of course."

I just digested that. She felt bewildered, overwhelmed by everything. Sights, sounds and the feelings that raced through me…the images that made no sense but when I tried to focus on them, they disappeared again.

The little girl in the blue dress with ruffles…horses racing across an open field. A young man with dark hair and a smile that warmed up my heart, his warm skin underneath my fingers. The smell of his cologne, his soft eyes…who was he? But before I could remember anything, he'd slipped away into the shadows with the rest of the images filling my head.

I just sat there wrapping my arms around myself trying to forget everything else for a while.

Matt

Chris had the car waiting for me at Phoenix International Airport like she promised and I drove it to the hotel. I checked in and took the elevator up to the suite on top. As soon as I got inside the room, I tossed my suitcase on the bed and reached for my cell phone. I'd checked it as soon as the plane landed but Chris hadn't called me back.

This time she'd left a message saying that C.J. hadn't called the office, I hadn't expected her to do so at this point. I knew something had happened to her and that she was in some type of trouble.

My mind worked quickly and I'd figured that the best place to start would be where she had last checked in which was in Phoenix. She was supposed to leave here after checking out of her hotel in the morning and reach Santa Fe by late afternoon…but I knew she'd never gotten there. So somewhere along the way, something had happened to her.

And I had to find her.

It was after midnight when I arrived so I settled in for the night. But I couldn't sleep, not when I didn't know what had happened to her. She was my best friend since I was a small boy and if it hadn't been for her more than once, I wouldn't have made it this far.

A glass of Scotch stopped my mind from racing, from filling with images of every possible thing that could have happened. Did she get in an accident, did she run into someone who had hurt her? Was she lying in a hospital somewhere, was she…I didn't finish that thought.

I had to think about her alive out there somewhere…and if she was in trouble, I wouldn't stop at anything to find her again.

That was my last thought before I closed my eyes to get some sleep.

Rhonda

I watched Bunny sit against the wall looking lost for a while and then I closed my eyes trying to get to sleep. Not that I felt like it but I knew how important it was to keep sharp to make the most of every opportunity to look for an escape route. I opened my eyes back to see her still sitting there.

"Hey Bunny…you should get some sleep," I said, "Don't know what the morning will bring."

She just looked at me and then she got up a bit stiffly and then walked over to the bottom bunk. I'd taken the top one. I heard the mattress squeak as she lay down on it. I knew that she was lost and couldn't help it. There had been times that I'd forgotten when I got drunk or high. But they always came back to me usually when I didn't want to remember them. I couldn't imagine what it'd be like to have no memory at all, to feel like a blank slate.

"Goodnight Rhonda…"

She sounded sleepy when she said that and I closed my eyes waiting to drift off. I was so used to sleeping at places worse than jail so I knew it wouldn't take long.

But my mind was already thinking of a way to get out of here.


	4. Chapter 4

Current day…

The judge called a recess not long after she'd been sworn into testify in the biggest trial currently going on at the courthouse. Marie had gone up to sidebar with the judge over some question she'd been asked about her prior history as an attorney. That got the defense attorney, some big shot named Tex Winston who came with the requisite Stetson hat, huge belt buckle and squeaky cowboy boots.

C.J. hated him on sight. Only partly because he'd come at her either hard or softly after Marie finished with her and mostly because he reminded her of one of the men who sat at the table right next to him Semour Piser.

The only defendant left to stand trial because the other players had all taken deals with Sheriff Butz being the last to fall in line and he'd been given partial immunity meaning he could plead out to a lesser charge of pandering and had already done most of his time. C.J. hadn't been happy when she learned about the deal made behind closed doors but as an attorney herself she understood it. Matt had liked it even less and made that absolutely clear.

He'd been just as guilty as Piser after all. He'd ordered just as many women to be murdered after they tried to escape and his deputies most of whom were doing longer prison terms right now had done what the boss had told them. And when Matt found out what he'd tried to do to her including the threats he made, he decided that the pummeling he'd given Butz when he caught up with him had allowed him to get off too easy.

Marie returned after conferencing with Tex and the judge.

"Court recess for about 30 minutes," she said, "Witness and jury have to leave. Just sit in the conference room until I come get you."

C.J. nodded and stood up. She looked out in the audience and saw Matt.

"I'll be fine," she said, "I know how this works…back when I did some criminal law myself."

Marie smiled.

"Ever think of returning to it?"

The question didn't catch C.J. completely off guard. She'd been asked it before after all but she loved working with Matt on his foundation and in his investigative agency even though she couldn't take an active role in it right now.

The last year had been really good for her, for the both of them in ways neither imagined before it all started. He'd just ended another engagement and she'd taken a couple months off working in a legal aid clinic in Puerto Rica…needing to get away from L.A. for a while. The time spent there helped her regain her perspective in a new and very exciting way.

But as for right now, she had 30 minutes and a few feet to travel to the man she wanted to share it with while the attorneys on both sides hashed out the issue.

Earlier…

C.J.:

My head finally stopped hurting so much and the dizziness faded away but I felt so damn thirsty having nothing to drink the entire day. Maybe for days longer…I had no idea what happened before I woke up beside the burning car.

Maybe my car…maybe there'd been someone else. Rhonda had said something about some guy working me up real good and she meant that he hit me. I don't remember anything about that…I remember a man. A young guy with dark curly hair and the most intense but warmest pair of brown eyes, lean but ruggedly built and…I don't know how I knew this but he never took a hand to me. I knew that somehow more than I knew just about anything.

Rhonda had started pacing the room. I could hear her as I lay on my bunk trying to make sense of what had happened. She and I, we'd been in the bar about to leave to go get something to eat at a nearby diner. I didn't have any money on me but she didn't care…she wanted to meet my friends. That sounded fine to me because I don't remember having any but I felt hungry.

Then the men had arrived, the bad men wearing badges. Was that what wearing badges meant, that you rushed into a place and grabbed women yanking them out of there and throwing them in the back of a van without a reason?

Soliciting what the hell was that anyway? I came in looking for something familiar to me in a world that I didn't recognize…anything that I might remember about my life. My name for starters but even without that…there were ways to figure out who I am…what I did and what happened to me.

Who was the man inside my mind, who would flash in front of me as plain as if he were standing there? What was his name and how did I know him?

"I know what they want Bunny…you still awake? You know if you hit your head you can't go to sleep…else you'll never wake up again."

I heard the certainty in her voice and thought, what did she mean by that? I close my eyes, I don't wake up again? Maybe I'm just dreaming about all what happened and instead I'll wake up in my own bed inside my own house and maybe with that man right beside me…holding me tight and telling me it's just a dream.

"I'm awake…I can't sleep. I don't know what's going to happen."

"Like I told you…they have a certain time before we have to go before a judge," Rhonda said, "Most likely they'll let us go with a citation…and then we'll have to do community service or pay a fine."

"A fine for what…what did we do anyway?"

Rhonda paused before answering.

"Nothing…this is a fucking setup," she said, "They do this to single woman all the time in these backwoods towns. Prey on them just to exhort our money out of us so we don't stay in jail."

Apprehension filled me…made my skin prickle and I felt almost breathless sometimes when I allowed myself to think too much.

"I don't have any money."

Rhonda chuckled in response.

"Oh you do honey…I know it based on your clothes, your watch," she said, "The cut and style of your hair…you come from money, you just don't remember that."

I touched my hair which just felt heavy in the waves that fell around my shoulders. Parts of it were stiff from where blood had dried most likely. I hadn't been able to wash it today to get it out.

"Someone's out looking for you," Rhonda said, "Someone's got to be…you tell anyone where you were going? Before you hit your head…?"

I sighed, trying to remember but knowing the futility of pushing too hard. I didn't want my head to start hurting again.

"I don't know…I don't know what I was doing just like I don't know who I am," I said, "I try to remember and it's…nothing."

"Don't push too hard then," Rhonda said, "You might bust an aneurysm."

I frowned not liking the word.

"A what?"

"Never mind…listen we've got to get a plan on getting out of here…and quick."

I propped myself up on the bunk, hearing the mattress squeak beneath me.

"Why…if we're just going to the judge, then what's to worry about…if it'll get us out of here."

Rhonda stopped pacing and I saw her outline near the only window.

"I don't know…but something's not right here…like I said it could be a scam so maybe we best not stick around and see how it ends."

I thought about that and I know I couldn't be here by myself. If Rhonda left, I wanted to go with her. Inside my head, I felt like we needed to…plan…figure out ahead of time what to do and it all fell together in the necessity of that. Almost as if I had been taught…but pushing beyond that made my head ache again.

"Okay then…what'll we do?"

I listened as Rhonda related her idea of what to do next.

Matt"

I can't sleep at all and it has nothing with being in a strange bed inside a hotel in another place. I'm a man who travels on business all around the world so I'm used to that. No, this is about wanting to see someone so badly that I ache with it and my mind can't settle down for sleep.

I had gotten some shuteye on the plane but now I just felt restless. I needed to find out what had happened to C.J. since we spoke last a day ago. I'd wasted too much damn time not listening to the feeling in my gut that something wasn't right…something had happened to her and that she needed me to come find her again.

She'd done the same for me so many times without asking. Been the best friend a little boy could possibly have after he'd been kidnapped and forced to lie in a hole deep in the ground in total darkness for days and nights. Feeling as if he'd been buried alive…and even after being rescued by his daddy, too damn scared to even talk about it…to anyone. I didn't want to hurt my daddy by being any different than what I'd been before the men took me. I wanted everything to be the same but it wasn't…I had nightmares that drenched my pajamas and nearly suffocated me and even in the day…I saw the men when they weren't really there.

If it hadn't been for C.J….I'd still be in that pit. Somehow she saw right through what I showed everyone else and saw what lived underneath. She reached out to me and I'd grabbed onto her like a life rope. Even as a little girl, she'd somehow understood people very well…and knew what to do or say to them. One reason why she'd made one hell of an attorney and business partner to me.

Then when I got kidnapped again just months ago and lost 30 days of my life, wiped clean like a slate. She'd been there to help me find the truth even though I'd been set up to look like the most brutal type of killer of an innocent woman.

She never stopped doing what she could to clear my name…even took a bullet and didn't want to tell me about it…so I wouldn't rush her to the hospital and get caught again. But there was no chance I'd ever trade her life for my freedom. So I ignored her protests as she bit back the pain to try to force me to go for my freedom and I got her to the hospital in time to save her life. She lay shivering in the seat next to me in the car and by the time I arrived at Mercy General, she'd been unconscious from loss of blood.

When they took her away to the operating room I knew I made the right decision even though within minutes I was forced against a wall and had cuffs slapped on my wrists by cops.

I'd gotten out of that and she'd told me something that I remembered now as I lay in bed trying to sleep. We'd been under a hail of bullets inside that building just inches away from where my ex girlfriend had taken a bullet to the chest. We thought we were next…that the next few moments…or seconds would be our last together on this earth.

She told me she loved me, so quietly but I heard it. It blew me away but there wasn't any time for that so I tucked it away inside of me because I knew that death wasn't going to get either one of us.

I never returned to what she told me and how it made me feel…being on the run made everything else secondary but the whole time I was away from her, I felt it more keenly than anything.

By the time I thought of telling her, life had gone one…my uncle joined me in my business and Robert breezed in like a blast from the past sweeping her off her feet and into his arms.

I knew I had to let it all go and move on in life…but even now later while I searched for her…I knew I couldn't ever forget it.


	5. Chapter 5

C.J. smiled as she sat by the conference room pouring herself a glass of water from the pitcher. Matt joined her as they both sat together waiting for the recess to end and the trial to resume.

"You think it's a mistrial this time?"

She shrugged, not knowing what to think. Recesses were called during trials all the time while attorneys hashed out disagreements on issues in front of the presiding judge. She could be back on the witness stand in a matter of minutes or done for the rest of the day.

"I hope not…I really want to get this done and behind me."

He reached for her hand and squeezed it when he took hold of it.

"I know and I hope this is it," he said, "but if it's not, we'll get through it okay?

She paused and then she nodded. She knew he was right. They'd been through two aborted trials that ended before she even reached the stand, one of them with the deal made by Butz. But she didn't want to spend any more of her life stuck in this process than necessary though she understood why she was here. She was one of the living like Rhonda, Fran and some of the others who were left to speak for the dead.

Carrie for one…Sheila and Holly, these were names that C.J. had only learned about later in the investigation process which tracked the past four years of Butz and Piser's prostitution ring. She'd wept for all of them as she got to know them through conversations with Marie and other prosecutors, some of the detectives with the state police that investigated the case.

The most shocking day of all had been when they were tipped off by one of the deputies who was looking for the easiest way out of jail and told them about the unmarked graves in the desert outside the dusty town in Bannon County.

She found out only later that she was supposed to join the dead women in one of those graves that this had been Butz' plans for her once she ceased to be Bunny and became C.J. Parsons, a missing lawyer out of L.A. Joining her in the desert would have been Matt, who had shown up looking for her. Not knowing he had met up with some of the ones responsible for C.J.'s disappearance.

Instead they had both survived and Butz and Piser had gone to jail with most of the deputies along with the bartender that ran the place where she and Rhonda had been arrested.

She looked over at him right now, her most favorite face in the whole wide world and she squeezed his hand back.

"I know Houston…I have to tell the whole story to the jury and then have the defense try to tear it apart slowly at the seams with each question."

"You can do this…and I'll be right there in the audience…you get lost up there, look at me."

She nodded, and smiled at him.

"Okay…and after we're done today…I want a steak dinner with all the trimmings…"

He leaned forward.

"I can do that…how about some roasted potatoes and some of those sautéed vegetables."

"I'll have to forgo the wine…"

He smiled again.

"We'll come up with something," he said, "whatever happens today you got yourself a date."

Earlier…

I opened my eyes wondering where I'd be and whether or not I'd slide back into my real identity like I'd never left it. But what I saw was a stream of sunlight that must have come though the bars of the window into the cell. I looked around and noticed I was still in the same bunk where I had fallen asleep.

My name, I knew it wasn't Bunny but didn't know what else to call myself. Rhonda had already woken up and was looking outside the window out onto what looked like a grassy yard with benches and tables. Some trees that were clearly planted not long ago and when I joined Rhonda I saw some women gathering near one of the tables to line up, obviously waiting for something to happen. A dark haired girl whose hair streamed down her back jostled with another blonde woman, while a tall woman with short red hair handed her a cigarette.

"Must be breakfast…"

Rhonda didn't sound too enthusiastic but I felt my stomach rumble. I didn't know when I'd last eaten and felt a bit weak.

"Should we go out and join them?"

Rhonda folded her arms.

"We're locked in here," she said, "We have to wait until they let us go out and join the others. I wonder what's keeping them."

I only shrugged my eyes still on what happened outside. I saw some deputies bring over steel bins and pitchers of liquid, placing them on the tables which attracted the attention of the women there who moved closer, shoving each other while they lined up.

None of what happened meant anything to me. Nothing made sense. I'd dreamed about the man while I slept but when I woke up, I was back here.

"Maybe they have something different in mind for us…since we're new."

It turned out she was partially right.

Butz:

I got a call from Piser hassling me about what happened at the last party on his ranch. He still hadn't gotten over Carrie taking off like that even though she'd been handled by Romart. My deputy made damn sure she'd never be a problem to anyone again.

It took him longer to come back this time. He had to drive further out of town into the desert because the bodies were starting to fill the areas closest to the town limits. The grave he dug for Carrie had taken him longer to dig because the lack of summer rains had made the dirt as hard as granite but he came back after three hours, the job done.

She'd been a pretty thing but nothing special. None of them were special. They were all someone's trash that had been thrown away. Girls kicked out of their homes by parents who tired of them. Wives tossed to the curb by husbands scraping to survive like alley cats. I gave them a way out, sure they got arrested and tossed into jail but they were heading that way anyway. It'd only be a matter of time until they wound up in the system. Runaways, truants, all around trouble makers, I did the world a favor by putting them to use when no one else wanted them.

When my guy Jake called me about these two girls that showed up in his place, I thought them just two more strays to pick up. But then I remember that Piser had told me flat out that I needed to get him some better classy girls for his parties for the big guys in the capitol. I wondered what world he lived in…classy women didn't just wonder through Bannon County, only the trashy ones did…so at first I thought I'd got me two more of them.

But when I saw Bunny, I knew I'd hit pay dirt. She wasn't some stray someone kicked out onto the street. If they did, the guy who messed her up was some rich dude who'd played with her and gotten tired trading her in for another girl. She had quality threads on, a fancy watch and looked like a woman who was going places. How she'd wound up here, I could only guess… a pretty looking thing like her didn't belong in Bannon County. But she'd just shown up anyway in the bar according to Jake and no one claimed her.

I figured her name wasn't Bunny but I'd play along with her game to get my hands on her and so Romart and I just grabbed them before they knew what happened. Oh, Bunny tried skipping out the back way but between Romart and me, we made short work of her and the other stray Rhonda. We grabbed them kicking and hitting like wildcats out of the bar and tossed them in the van.

We knew the ride would settle them down and we'd deal with them back at the detention center but I knew on the drive there, I already had plans for Bunny. I know the rules…I knew that Piser had first pick of any girl I picked up and he picked their dates for them. I just kept the records for him because they'd be safer with me than with a member of the state parole board.

No, Piser wouldn't be getting his hands on Bunny. He'd just never know about her. I'd hide her away in the jail where he couldn't find her and keep her out of the record keeping. There were ways to hide her from him so I could keep her myself.

She looked wild in the bar but I knew how to handle women like that, how to break them like fillies and get them to go with the program. I let them know what would happen to them if they broke the rules and that plus the promise of lighter sentences kept most of them in line.

I didn't know if it'd work with Bunny but I knew what to do with her. I had to show her who was boss over her, who she belonged to, who owned her body and controlled it. Who made the decision whether she'd live each day or wind up buried in the unmarked grave in the desert with the rest of them.

Soon I'd find out how smart she was, how quick she learned and what she was willing to do to stay alive each day and each night.

I called Romart into the office and told him to bring her straight to me.

Matt:

I hit the road not long after sunrise. Didn't sleep much of the night but hit the diner for a quick omelet and a lot of black coffee to wake me up. I knew it'd be a long day ahead spent out looking for her and I didn't know how it'd end.

I might find her soon enough in some hotel or motel maybe having gotten so caught up in her road trip that she'd forgotten to check in. I vetoed that scenario right off. People didn't come along more responsible than C.J. and she'd never failed to check in on time no matter what. I knew she did it so I wouldn't worry about her but she also knew that if she ever ran into trouble she couldn't get out of then her record of doing so might wind up saving her life.

That'd happened more than once including when she'd been at the hospital two years back visiting Bo who'd been hurt by a bomb in a birthday present for me. Delivered to me special by a assassin that had been crashed out of prison by Costanos, the man who I had once hunted relentlessly who had started hunting me. C.J. had been kidnapped by him and an accomplice after leaving the hospital and when she hadn't checked in, I knew right away before calling Vince that Costanos had her. Even before he called me personal to give the news.

I just knew my best friend would always check in with me to reassure me everything was okay. Only this time she hadn't and so I knew she needed my help. But how to find her considering she might have covered as several hundred miles of highway from Phoenix where she last checked in to Santa Fe where she was supposed to be.

So I knew she wasn't at a motel, so that left hospitals and police stations to check in on the way in case she either wound up injured or had been the victim of a crime. The one thing that I didn't want to think about was another mandatory place to check, and that would be the morgues.

I closed my eyes just thinking of the word and knew I couldn't face the task of having to ID a body that turned up…that might be her…just because I didn't get to her in time.

No, I had to keep positive. She was out there and she might be in trouble but I knew she must be alive. I couldn't think of it any other way and I knew I'd find her.

So I got in the rental and started down the highway which was mostly desert. A lot of wide open space clear to the distant mountains and the sun rising over them into the sky. It'd be a hot day I knew and I imagined her out there wandering in the scorching heat of the desert.

What had happened to her? She couldn't have disappeared off the face of the earth but as I checked in every city and town…or truck stop on the way no sign of her in any hospitals, police stations, motels and most thankfully, in any morgue.

I knew that I'd be heading into what the map called Bannon County which had towns sprinkled throughout it none of them of any significance. All surrounded by some of the most barren desert in this part of the country.

Nothing to be found there I felt pretty sure but decided I needed to check it out anyway so I kept driving until I reached the county limits.

And that's when everything changed.


	6. Chapter 6

C.J. never imagined what it'd be like to sit on the witness stand and testify about what had happened when she'd had amnesia. What it'd been like to wake up and not remember anything, like having a blank slate on one's life. She still didn't know who'd she became when she didn't have her identity to fall back on and whether or not that persona she'd adopted to survive had completely left her.

Her counselor told her that most likely she'd slowly integrated it into her own personality. She'd noticed changes in herself from what had happened in Bannon County. The year that had followed had been eventful in both good and in bad ways for her and those she loved. She'd smiled and shed some tears just at the memories.

But now she had to focus on answering Marie's questions. Those would come much more easily than having to do the same with Tex who raised an objection here and there and conferred with Piser who sat next to him.

"So when you first were brought to the jail, what were you thinking? Were you wondering what you did wrong? That these officers of the law sworn to take an oath to serve and protect had other more sinister plans for you instead?"

C.J. knew enough not to answer and she watched as Tex stood out of his chair in response.

"Objection Your Honor…Leading the witness…again I might add."

Marie folded her arms.

"Establishing foundation…as to her mindset when she got there…"

Tex howled.

"She had amnesia for god sake. What the hell does it matter what she was thinking?"

The judge flashed a stern look at him.

"Language Mr. Winston…I warned you more than once," the judge said, "But objection sustained, rephrase your question…"

"Okay…now when you were first bought to the jail, what were you thinking?"

C.J. paused before answering, the memories flashing through her head again.

"That I'd fallen in a deep dark hole and I'd never see the light outside of it again…"

Earlier…

C.J.:

I waited inside the cell as the sun shone more forcibly through the window, lighting up the entire cell. It looked different in the daylight, sparse with little inside it besides us. Two bunk attached to the wall, with bedding on them. A sink fixed to the wall with what might have been a mirror above it but when I got out of bed to wash up as best I was able I couldn't see my reflection. I hadn't known much about what I looked like beyond that I had thick hair that had been stained by blood. I wore clothes that Rhonda had told me meant I came from money. My watch would fetch some serious money; she'd told me too if I pawned it. I looked it and nothing registered about it, just a watch that told me that many hours had passed since I'd wound up inside a body I barely recognized.

"God, I wish they'd feed us," Rhonda moaned, "I haven't eaten since breakfast yesterday."

I hadn't eaten not that I remembered. My stomach rumbled too but I felt this tension inside of me that just wouldn't leave. I wanted to get out of here in the worst way. Whoever I was I couldn't belong here…no it just didn't feel…but then again I was here right now trying to see my reflection in a mirror that reflected nothing.

Rhonda had started pacing again. I felt like it too but I knew I needed to save my energy. My head didn't hurt so much but my muscles ached and I felt a bit dizzy. Maybe eating something would help because I really needed to clear my head if I was ever going to figure out what to do…how to get out of here.

We both heard the footsteps approaching at the same time and our attention turned towards the locked door of our cell and Rhonda walked up to look out the small window just before two deputies unlocked it and then opened it.

Rhonda folded her arms.

"About time you showed up," she said, "I'm feeling real hungry right now and I'm not happy when I'm hungry."

Romart and another deputy, Ortiz according to his tag just looked at each other and then Ortiz gestured to Rhonda.

"You…are going to join the others for the morning meal," he said, "We've got something special for you to do later today and so don't doddle with your food."

She didn't budge.

"Just get me fed and then I'll be ready to do anything…"

Ortiz grabbed her arm and she left the cell. I started to follow her thinking I'd be joining her at breakfast but Romart stepped in my path.

"Not you sugar…you're going to see Butz first."

That confused me. Why wasn't I going to join the others? What did Butz want with me? I knew he was the sheriff who had grabbed me last night at the bar as I'd fought so hard to get away. He'd enjoyed it too, Iknew that and Iknew he thought I was pretty.

"You better behave yourself too," Romart said, "It'll go a lot better that way."

He grabbed my arm hard and I fought the urge to shrug him off of me as we walked to Butz' office.

Rhonda

That creep Ortiz took me out to the yard where the other girls were either lined up getting food or sitting at tables eating and talking about nothing. You didn't share much about behind bars, lest it be used against you. Never show any sign of weakness and don't snitch out someone else. I walked out there beside Ortiz like I was some tough shit.

But inside, I might be just as wary but I always felt fear. Just couldn't show it to anyone. Bunny had been real good at that before like she'd learned that lesson too, not to show fear to the enemy. Maybe she had done some time after all. Just no telling with someone who lost all their memories except it got beaten out of them or they'd come off one hell of a bender. Like I told her, been there myself.

I got into line and noticed right off a young girl looking barely out of her teens with long dark hair and an attitude. There's a top dog in every jail yard, and being that we're women a top bitch. I knew it must be this girl by the chip she carried on her shoulder and the way she'd strutted to the table.

Make that a boulder on her shoulder as she shoved some blonde chick onto the ground in a split second and took her seat as if she owned it.

She probably did. The way the others deferred to her. Fran, her name was as Ortiz had mentioned her when we came out on the yard.

Don't get on her bad side, he warned. But I didn't take flak from anyone even a girl who fancied herself the top bitch of the yard. The tall girl with the short red hair was her sidekick, Babs and she catered to Fran's every whim.

Pathetic…but I just picked up my tray after a deputy named Jenkins loaded it with food including the usual powdered eggs and flabby ham meal I'd eaten so many times and a glass of something that resembled orange punch

Then I went to go sit down but that's when Fran stood up from her seat to check me out and she didn't look too pleased judging by the look on her face.

Great, my first morning in jail, my first breakfast and I was already looking at my first slap down.

Matt:

The highway just stretched in front of me all the way to the horizon and I'd traveled more of it than I wanted to in my search for C.J. The list of hotels, motels, police stations, deputy headquarters, hospitals and…morgues grew but still no sign of her.

Nothing like her had shown up in any places or anything. I heard that over and over again and my frustration grew but a part of me felt deeply relieved too.

At one morgue in a small hospital in a town named Cactus Rose I had to check out a Jane Doe that had turned up dumped at the side of the road. No ID on her partly clad body…her body badly bruised and she'd been a young woman in good health and with wavy brunette hair when she'd been alive a day or so earlier.

Probably accepted a ride home from the wrong person, the deputy told me as we went down the elevator into the basement not that I heard much of what he told me. My heart was squeezed so tight inside my chest, my mouth dry as sandpaper as I tried to tell myself over and over, it's not her lying inside a drawer with the rest of the bodies. Not C.J. my best friend and I felt guilty for wanting it not to be her but someone else. Someone else's best friend, daughter or mother and I hated myself for that I just couldn't face losing her not like this…not when I could have acted sooner when she hadn't called and been out here and probably found her by now. I'd never be able to live with myself if I found out I'd been one hour, one second too late to save her life.

I'd been down this road before and it'd nearly destroyed me. My cousin…Will and I were tight like brothers growing up. We did everything together. Riding including some mean son of a gun bulls in rodeos, hiked together in the foothills near the ranch, played football together and when Will wanted to enlist to aid Uncle Sam in fighting terrorism around the world, I signed up too.

Only I'd come back home in one piece and he hadn't…I'd lost him too and watched him get leave Bagdad with his squad out to do some recon and next I knew…the entire squad was blown up and he'd turned up missing presumably dead.

It'd been 10 years and I'd never seen him again. Nothing to visit but a headstone covering an empty grave plot in a cemetery just outside of Houston….just in case his body even a piece of him identified with DNA testing could be found. They had all our samples on file, I knew it could happen, it just hadn't yet.

But I'd nearly driven myself to the nut house for a while there because I knew I could have saved him, if only I'd just known that death waited for my cousin just outside my view. If it hadn't been for C.J…well she'd pulled me out of it…and then kicked me to the curb. Leaving me to decide whether or not I wanted to live myself…told me later it was the toughest thing she ever did…chewing me out, ripping me a new one and I said things back to her…I couldn't ever take back…but when the dust settled I did find my way back and when she pulled me into her arms when I'd cried for the first time in years in front of someone…I felt at home again.

Now I had to pull her out of something but I didn't know what. I just knew I had to find her while there was still time.

There just had to be time…and that's what I thought when I drove down the god forsaken stretch of barren highway looking for any sign of her.

And that's when I saw the burned up shell of a car by the side of the road. My heart nearly stopped inside of me as I took a closer look at it and then I knew.

I'd found her car.


	7. Chapter 7

C.J. left the witness stand for the noon recess, feeling thoroughly drained already and she hadn't even finished telling her story. Not that Tex seemed eager to let her go into great detail about what had happened to her when she'd been held captive at the Bannon County Detention Center.

She lost count of how many times he'd barked objections interrupting her narrative. But she knew that was part of the problem. Tex didn't want the jury to hear a cohesive account of what had happened including the crimes that had been committed against her and the other women. He wanted it broken into pieces the jury couldn't make sense of until he could use his cross-examination to recreate a tale that would portray his client in a much more favorable light.

But lunch recess had interrupted and the judge had tossed in an extra hour due to a judges' staff meeting that would take the additional time. C.J. finished her glass of water and got up to go meet Matt who remained in the room after most everyone else had left.

He wrapped his arms around her without her needing to ask him. After all he'd been watching her testify the past several hours and he knew what it took out of her.

The prosecutor and he had reached a tenuous understanding. Marie took care of C.J. while she was on the witness stand and he took over once she stepped off of it.

"Let's go get some lunch okay?"

She nodded, leaning her head against his shoulder a bit while they left the courtroom to the car.

"You think I'm doing okay?"

"You're the lawyer," he said, "I'm just the PI."

She smiled at him.

"I know but it's different when the lawyer's the one set to be grilled rather than the one doing the grilling."

She tried not to betray the nervousness in her voice but he read it anyway. She knew when he tightened his grip.

"Yeah I'm sure it is but you've got the truth C.J. and that counts for a lot."

She smiled again at him for saying that but she knew often that might not be enough.

"I hope so…and not just for me."

He knew what she meant…the testifying might be done by the living who had been left to speak for the dead.

Earlier…

Butz:

The phone rang while I waited for Romart to bring in the prisoner, the one who called herself Bunny. I knew it would be Piser before I picked it up.

"Hello Piser…"

"Butz…have you gotten any new girls for the party tonight? I have three state senators coming this time who'll owe me by the time it's done."

I knew he had been counting on me to make up for the debacle at the last party held at his ranch just outside of town.

"I do…in fact I picked up a couple of numbers last night…Jake tipped me off on two gals who showed up at his bar and so I got a deputy and went to pick them up."

"I see…more strays who wandered into town?"

The smile that crept across my face was for me alone because I knew that under our deal Piser had first pick of the new additions to our collection of party girls. But not this time, not with a quality piece like Bunny.

"Maybe…but I've got one who's ready for the party, a pretty redheaded thing who'll be a crowd pleaser."

Piser paused.

"I'll check her out when she arrives with the others," he said, "you said two girls…"

I hesitated knowing I had to play my cards carefully. I had no intention of letting Piser get his hands on Bunny, squeezing me out of keeping her to myself. I'd been looking for a replacement to the last girl who I looked after in exchange for some good times. I treated her real good, dressed her up real nice and she played along.

Until one day she tried to escape over the tall fence surrounding the detention center and almost got away. Almost didn't count enough and she earned herself a long nap out in the desert, her body reduced to bones and dust by now under that hot sun.

I knew I had to teach this Bunny right from the start. But that meant keeping her a secret from my partner on the phone.

"She's a pretty young thing…but not nearly ready," I said, "Soon as I get her settled, she'll be on the list."

I heard him chuckle on the other end.

"Soon as you're done having fun with her…I get it but she better not be the better of the two," he said, "You hold out on me and I'm not going to be too happy with you and you know how I get when I'm not happy."

I did surely enough and I kept Piser happy. But this time he'd be happy and ignorant. Suddenly I heard the footsteps of my deputy and I knew he was bringing her to me.

"Got to go Piser…I'll see you later at the party…"

"Okay but this batch of girls had best be better than the last or I'll rethink this partnership."

I shrugged. He'd threatened that before many times but never followed through with it. Truth was, he needed me because otherwise he'd be exposed and a man in his position couldn't afford that.

That's where I came in, I did all the heavy stuff and I deserved a little extra because of that and as I looked towards the doorway, I saw that my little extra had just walked in.

I told my deputies to leave us alone.

Matt:

When I saw the car, I didn't think the worst right away. I'd been with her when she'd bought it at a dealership to replace her old Mustang that had been dropping parts all over L.A. She really needed to get herself a new set of wheels so she finally agreed to it.

Telling me right off she didn't want anything fancy…just a ride that would get her places she needed to go without showing off. I loved my fancy cars with all their accessories, the most powerful engine money could buy and the best looking bodywork. Slim, when she'd worked for me had kept my collection of cars all looking so nice and running perfect. But she fell in love with a pro surfer that hit Malibu for a good time on his way to Half Moon Bay. The two of them hit it off at one of those dance clubs and soon enough got hitched for real within six weeks of when they first met.

I was real happy for them but it cost me my best mechanic and so my turnover in cars had picked up quite a bit. I stuck mostly with the red Mercedes convertible but had gotten a rental when the plane touched the ground in Phoenix. Along with extra insurance given that my track record with rentals wasn't so great.

Cost of doing business in a dangerous profession I called it but the insurance company called it higher premiums on top of a first tier deductible.

But C.J. had found herself a nice convertible and fallen in love with it so she put cash down on it right away and took it home.

Right now, it had been burned to a crisp, the metal all twisted and I knew she'd been in some sort of accident. But I also knew she'd more than likely gotten herself out of the car in time unless…but no, she hadn't turned up in any hospitals or morgues so far.

The man looked up as I drove off the highway and pulled into the parking lot of his garage. It looked like he'd just hauled her car from someplace else.

"Where'd you find that?"

He shrugged.

"Oh down the road a bit," he said, "No one there…must have been abandoned. I recognized it though."

"How…it belongs to a friend of mine."

The man's brows arched up.

"A lady friend…?"

I nodded and pulled out a familiar photo that I'd been showing people all day. It had been taken when she first started working for Houston Enterprises back when it'd been smaller.

"Listen is she hurt, where can I find her? Have you seen her anywhere?"

All these thoughts ran through my head all a sudden and I didn't want my questions answered though I knew there was no avoiding it. But the man just glanced at the photo not looking too concerned about it.

"Yeah that's her. She pulled in her yesterday I think it was…pretty young thing," he said, "but no one like hers turned up in the hospitals or morgues or anything."

I felt the familiar relief flood through me at his words. God knows I wanted to find her but I knew she had to be out there alive and not lying dead on a slab in the basement of some hospital.

"I bet she just wrecked her car and left it…maybe hitched a ride into the next town," the man said, "I'm sure she'll turn up."

I nodded and left knowing there was a town about two miles down the highway and I'd stop there and ask around. Maybe stop and get a bite to eat after I checked in with Chris back in L.A.

I got back into my car and drove towards it, not knowing what waited for me there.

C.J.:

I walked inside Butz office and I knew I was in serious trouble. I definitely knew it when he ordered the deputies who brought me to leave us alone.

Just the two of us and when he got that smile on his face…I felt coldness deep inside of me that I didn't know existed inside a person. I wanted to run but my feet remained planted, nowhere to run to right now that I wouldn't just get caught again.

He just looked at me, examined me so thoroughly with those beady eyes which sank into his puffy face. His hair looked unkempt, his body solid if heavy in bulk. That damn star pinned to his chest meant only one thing to me, that those who wore it could do what they wanted to anyone. I knew he intended to do just that with me.

He walked towards me and I took a step backward.

"Shy are we…well hanging with those girls will change all that…what's your name by the way?"

His voice all friendly like losing the menace that laced it before…I knew I was being played by him but I remained silent almost as if I didn't understand. Mostly not acting because I didn't understand what was happening or how I'd gotten here.

"I heard it's Bunny…"

I knew that wasn't my name. Whatever it was…I knew I wasn't named after an animal. But he'd gone to his desk and started writing it down on some paper.

"My name's not Bunny…"

He just leered at me as it didn't seem to matter much to him.

"You're a pretty young thing aren't you…a bit shy but that don't bother me," he said, "I can make your life very simple or very difficult. I'll just tell you that right now."

I just looked at him, following him with my eyes carefully as he got out of his chair again and started moving around. That put me on edge, on the balls of my feet. My hands itching at my sides, feeling useless…as all I could do was watch him. I didn't know what he wanted from me or why I'd been brought here.

"You wanting simple…or much harder… because I think you're the nicest looking piece of ass I've seen in these parts in a good while."

I just balled my hands into fists still watching him as he came closer, close enough so I could smell his odor rankled my nose. I didn't dare move; I didn't dare imagine what he wanted…because I was beginning to understand.

"I might keep you for myself you know that," he said, "Dress you in fine silks, satins…"

He reached out with one of his sweaty hands and started touching me, caressing the collar of my top, his fingers straying over my upper hands. I wanted to shrink away but the look in his eyes stopped me.

"Take good care of you…watch over you…keep you out of the general population…be a shame to see that pretty face of yours scratched up by a bunch of alley cats…"

I felt the panic inside of me then. No, he couldn't want…I didn't know exactly what he wanted but a piece of me I held the tightest, the closest to the part of me…that was me.

"You got a mouth…you just going to stand and stare at me?"

I found my voice, haltingly.

"I…I don't understand…what is it that you want from me?"

He just chuckled.

"Oh a whore like you might be dressed up nicely but don't mean you don't know what I want…and you're going to give it to me…"

I tried to back away and he grabbed my arm, squeezing it tight, forcing me to look at him.

"I…."

Then his eyes grew harder than any I'd ever seen before and his grip tightened.

"It's time to start your orientation and by the time I finish, you'll do exactly what I want."

I looked at him, my body frozen, my heart thudding inside my chest unable to move and I knew exactly what he wanted.


	8. Chapter 8

C.J. lay next to him on the bed in semi darkness back at the hotel. With the extra hours for recess, all she wanted to do was go back and forget about it all for a while. Matt drove them back to their suite and they settled in to order some room service, some sandwiches and iced tea with lemon. They just talked about the work they'd left behind which seemed like more normal conversation. After he cleared the plates away, she headed to the bed for some rest, curling up on top of the covers.

He slipped in next to her without asking and wrapped his arms around her while she placed her head on his chest listening for his heartbeat as she often did when they were together.

"Busy morning wasn't it?"

She chuckled.

"You could say that…I know I can do this and I've waited long enough. It's not easy but it's not as hard as I thought it might be. It's almost like…"

"A relief…?"

She moved her face to look at him.

"Yeah…exactly…Those were really difficult times…scary too but so much has happened since then…so many good things."

He agreed with her in words and with the way he settled a hand on one of her hips and then kissed her softly on the mouth, tasting her. Her breath quickened as it usually did when everything else receded and she focused on him and the ways that he loved her.

Then he pulled away, their faces inches apart and his eyes looked so damn serious.

"Some very special things too…"

She nodded, understanding what he meant and then she kissed him again.

Earlier…

CJ:

I didn't dare move…because if I did…he might want it more. Weren't men like that, they'd find out what you didn't want them to do and then they did it anyway? I didn't want the bartender to look at me like he did when I entered. I wanted him to help me figure out who I am and what had happened to me. I wanted him to tell me that he knew me from my having been there before or I wanted him to point me to someone who would help me with my questions.

Instead, he looked at me just like Butz looked at me right now. He offered me a cot to rest in the back but the way he looked…I didn't trust it or him. I was learning not to trust…maybe it wasn't a new skill for me. Had I ever trusted anyone?

Then in an instant it hit me. The answer to that question when I saw the man again in front of me.

Yes…

He wasn't there now. I had to deal with the man in front of me. The man with the star on his chest and the gun on his waist….I had wanted him to help me too. But instead he yelled at me, chased me as if I were prey and grabbed hold of me so tightly I could barely breathe. I could fight and the blood rushed through me, I knew I had fought before to get away.

Butz just stood looking at me as if he had all the time in the world and I didn't. Balling my fists at my side had given me some resolve but I knew I'd never make it to the door and if I did…I didn't know how many deputies waited to catch me.

"Nowhere to go Bunny…until I'm finished with you…"

I swallowed the bile that threatened to rise up my throat and felt my heart pounding in my chest, heard a rushing sound inside my head like a current. My eyes flittered around the room, looking for anything to help me.

"Now don't be giving me any trouble now."

I didn't move and neither did he but I counted down the seconds. Inside my head a plan formed from I couldn't guess where. Something or someone told me to center my gravity, lower body, legs counted more than upper and to look for certain things…weaknesses in my opponent.

"To out maneuver him, you must outthink him first…"

Then his muscles twitched slightly and I knew he'd grab me so I had to act quickly but he anticipated my movement and grabbed me with both arms, pulling me towards him. I pushed against him so hard, but his grip on my body, too strong and I knew he was going to kiss me.

His breath hot and stinky on my face and his body hard against me, his mouth touched mine and I recoiled so much as he pressed his lips so hard against mine, his taste so vile. Our bodies so close together I couldn't push him off of me. He loosened his grip, his hands sliding over my body trying to get underneath my clothes. I felt fear, humiliation all rise up inside of me and anger too.

Mostly feeling anger, the most important of all, I'd learned that too.

Even though I hated his fingers slipping underneath my shirt and brushing bare skin as they inched towards my breasts, I knew that he'd made himself vulnerable so I pushed my hands against him harder and that separated us enough so that I could use my knee to go for one of the weak spots.

He hated that, his eyes narrowed and his mouth twisted and I felt fear inside of me, it chilled me to the point where I didn't think I'd ever feel warm again. He hit me across the face so hard I thought it might knock me out…instead I fell backwards on the couch and scooted myself into a position where I could protect myself.

Try to protect myself. My cheek smarting, eyes stinging with tears. I saw him approach and I knew I'd never get away from him before…

Was this why I was here…why I existed at all? So this man could hurt me in the worst possible of ways? I didn't know what it all meant.

"I could keep you here forever where no one would ever find you," he said, "Likely no one's even trying…someone threw you out like trash and I was just trying to help you…"

I shook my head at him as he neared the couch, trying to pull my legs up so my knees brushed my chin but on the couch…too difficult. My eyes too fixated on him. He couldn't be right could he? Somewhere out there someone had to be looking for me, someone who'd never quit looking until he found and got me. Unless he was right…I didn't know what I'd come from or if I'd ran from something bad into something worse.

Or what scared me even more, something better than what I left. I shook my head at him trying to make myself even smaller.

"No…"

He jumped onto the couch, pulling on me until his body pressed so hard against mine that I barely felt the couch beneath me. His hands were everywhere while his mouth kissed mine again. I tried to dodge it but could barely move.

"Damn you bitch…stop moving…"

But I couldn't…I might not be much…I might be a bitch or a whore who didn't know it. I did know I didn't want this…so I wrestled with him as he tried to unsnap my pants, bucking against him and when he tried to kiss me again…I didn't know how much longer I'd be able to fight someone so much stronger.

Fighting wasn't enough…I was one person, a woman surrounded by men so much stronger than me. Men who could kill me…was it worth dying?

I didn't want to know…so even as I weakened I still pushed against him. He'd forced himself between my legs but couldn't work the pants.

"None of you have gotten away from me yet…"

Then the door opened and I knew someone had arrived. Butz looked up enough from what he was doing to give me an opening. I took it and smacked him across the face and for an instant…I thought he might hit me back again. But he seemed more focused for the time being on the door.

I heard Romart's voice.

"Sheriff, we need your attention in the yard…"

Butz sounded annoyed.

"Can't you see I'm busy? I haven't finished her orientation."

Just the mention of that hated word gave me the strength to push him off the couch just enough so I could wiggle out from under him and dash across the room to crouch next to a filing cabinet.

"Some girls dusting it up in the yard…need you to break it up…"

Butz adjusted his clothing.

"Can't you do anything without me?"

Romart just eyed Butz and me trying to hide behind the filing cabinet and shrugged. I remembered him from the bar when he'd helped Butz get Rhonda and me out of there. I knew he wasn't nice but he didn't seem interested in me like Butz.

"You want me to take her back for you?"

Butz shook his head.

"I'm not done yet," he said, "Just lock her up in the office and I'll be back."

The two men left and I heard some commotion outside and then a man yelling before a gunshot. I flinched when I heard it not daring to go to the window to look outside. I just stayed by the filing cabinet shivering, still feeling Butz' hands all over me, the taste of him on my mouth…I wanted to throw up but my stomach just lurched.

Then I saw the mirror and I turned towards it and stared at the woman looking back at me. Very pretty she'd been called…dressed like she came from money…had friends people wanted to get to know…but who only existed for one reason.

Who was she? Who was I?

I stared into my reflection.

"Who am I? Who am I?"

The woman never answered.

Butz:

Damn it, can't Romart and the rest of them break up a cat fight in the yard without my help? I didn't get Romart at all. I knew he could snap one of these cats' necks in a second or fire a bullet into their head without thinking twice.

Yet when it came to a simple spat between two or more of them in the yard with their claws bared he came running for me.

I broke it up quickly enough as always between who else but Fran and the new redheaded girl I had talked up to Piser on the phone earlier. She'd have to calm down some before the party tonight but Romart told me he'd take care of that.

Soon it'd be time to herd them all back into the showers to wash up before they'd get their costumes for Piser's pool party.

I wanted to get back to Bunny and finish with her. She wouldn't be going to the party of course but I'd lock her up in her cell and be back for something special later tonight.

Yes, I knew with some firm handling she'd be a nice one.

Matt:

The town had one main street through one end of it to the other, a strip of businesses the types that turned up in dusty towns off the highways like this one. Couldn't even catch the name of it since the sign hadn't been in one piece…but probably didn't matter much even to those who lived here.

It had been hours since breakfast so I thought I'd get a bite to eat somewhere before I hit the police stations, hospitals and a morgue if this town had one What every small town had was at least one diner where most regulars hung out when they were on the trip doing business. I found one but it looked closed so I parked my car and went to look for another.

Saw a small bar that happened to be open and of course it'd be a great place to ask people there if they'd seen here around. But only one man was inside, standing behind the bar cleaning some glasses. He looked up at me when I walked up to him.

"You looking for something to wet your whistle?"

I reached into my pocket to pull out the faded photo.

"I'm looking for a woman," he said, "She's in the photo."

The man took it from me and seemed to study it intently. Did that mean that he had seen her in here? But then he just shook his head and handed it back.

"Nah, haven't seen her. I'd notice if I did…she's quite a looker," he said, "Your wife or girlfriend?"

He seemed like a friendly enough guy but something about him…it put me on edge. I knew I had great instincts, been trained by the best in military intelligence…between that and working as an investigator, I just trusted my own judgment.

"Just a friend…She's a lawyer out of L.A. named C.J. Parsons," he said, "She was driving to New Mexico on business and crashed her car up the highway…no one's see her since."

The man shrugged, picking up a glass to dry it.

"Maybe she hitchhiked next town over…or met up with a guy. Been known to happen."

I bristled at his words and his attitude. C.J. just wasn't like that…I knew as well as I'd ever known anything that something had happened to her, something bad and I knew I had to find her quick. If this man wasn't going to help me…I knew I needed to watch him for a while so I walked up over to a table and picked up a menu.

"Your burgers any good…?"

The man looked up at me.

"Best in these parts…course not much competition."

He chuckled at his own joke and then he took my order and left to go somewhere presumably the kitchen.

After he left, I pulled out the photo of her again, telling her over and over again to stay put because I was going to find her.

Jake:

My hands trembled as I put a dime in and punched in the number. I wished sometimes I'd get the landline working here again but I'd been on the damn waiting list for long already…I got Butz right away at his desk.

"You know that hot number you picked up last night…the brunette one?"

Butz barked back the affirmative and then asked me why I'd asked.

"A man's shown up…and he's come looking for her…"


	9. Chapter 9

C.J. yawned and then got out of bed. Not that she wanted to leave it and the man who remained there looking at her.

"Time to face reality again…"

Matt got up and sat on the edge of the bed watching her as she paced a bit.

"You're doing great…I think the jury's really paying attention."

She smiled at him but her eyes still looked uneasy.

"I'm getting the easy part of it behind me," she said, "Tex is up next and he's going to make me look like I had it coming…that his client was only trying to help me."

She didn't say the rest of it, like I was trash. Not that she held it against Tex to do the best he could by Piser as his defense attorney. She'd do the same if she were in his shoes; do whatever it took to help get her client off. Well anything that wouldn't get her disbarred of course. She'd done some time clerking for none other than F. Lee Bailey and worked a stint in the public defender's office back in Houston until Matt talked her into working as a legal eagle for his upstart of a company. The one he set up to show his daddy he would make it on his own without his help or his money. But he wanted her help and the best legal skills that he could get…which meant her and who could pass up an offer like that?

She had no regrets of course. A few battle scars perhaps but she wouldn't trade her life with anyone else's.

Matt got up and slid his arms from behind pulling her closer to him. She loved the smell of him, and closed her eyes. Inside her eyelids she saw images of their lives together. Both the good times that they'd spent together and the challenges that they faced…everything that had brought them where they were right now.

"He can never change who you are C.J," he said, "and his client is going to prison for what he did to you and the other women."

She hoped that what she had to say would help put Piser away for a long time, that the jury would believe her version of events

"I know Houston but it doesn't change what happened or the fact that I changed."

He pulled her into a kiss, his lips brushing against hers before he tilted her face up with a couple fingers so she could look directly at him.

"Not in the ways that matter now."

She sighed feeling the emotions from him right now and how good they made her feel. Still a part of herself from those dark days would always remain with her, one of many threads that made up what defined her.

"But it did matter then…," she said, "I was someone else for a little while…someone who just wanted to survive…"

Earlier…

CJ:

I remained in the office after they left me there. I knew that Butz had locked the door behind him but I tried it anyway. Just to find a way out of there so I could look for Rhonda and we could both escape from this place.

But the doorknob wouldn't move in my hand and I backed away knowing that I was stuck here until Butz and his deputies returned. I knew when that happened he'd finish what he had started with me and I didn't know how I'd be able to stop him. I wanted to live after all, if I didn't go along with what he wanted, he'd kill me and I knew no one would ever see me again. I'd just disappear into the earth…as if I'd never been here.

I already felt like I'd disappeared.

Then it hit me that I needed to know more about the man who had grabbed me and brought me here to do what he wanted. I knew he ran the place and the deputies obeyed him. They all wore stars on their chests which meant they were abusive towards women, taking advantage of them.

All I had right now was his name.

I felt myself drawn to his desk by something inside of me that just felt like instinct. He had stacked papers and files in a disorderly fashion on top of it and when I glanced at them, I didn't find anything that caught my attention. I knew I had to act quickly before Butz and the others returned so I went straight to the desk and started pulling out drawers which were filled with more papers that didn't mean much to me and some folders.

I flipped open a brown folder and photos suddenly spilled out of it. Pictures of women clad in what looked like swimsuits that left much of their skin exposed. Some of them posed with older men who weren't dressed in swimsuits in chairs and chaises that looked as if they were outside. In some of the photos, the women sat in the men's laps while the men's hands were touching them. I didn't recognize any of the women…they smiled in some of the pictures but their expressions were frozen…their eyes looking past whoever took the photos as if they were looking someplace else. Maybe they were someplace else…maybe that's what they did to be able to sit there while the men's hands were on them, their arms, hips and breasts. As if they weren't women at all, just playthings for their entertainment.

But why did Butz have these photos tucked in a folder hidden underneath a stack of papers in his desk drawer?  
Then I saw a piece of paper underneath where the photos had been and I pulled it out. On it, were just names scribbled on the sheets, what looked like names of men paired up with those belonging to women and on top of each sheet, a date and time…and something about barbecues and pool parties.

I didn't see Butz or any of his deputies in the photos…just the men who looked like they were having more fun than the women at these parties. I knew that what I read right now was very important…that it served some purpose but I didn't know what…I knew I needed help but I was all alone. It seemed to me just then that it wasn't always that way.

There'd been someone else with me…a man…nice looking with the most amazing smile on his face, the warmth in his brown eyes as he appeared in front of me just then…I couldn't look away from it. I knew he wasn't really there but I could feel him…I still didn't know his name anymore than I knew my own but all of a sudden I knew what I had to do.

I sat down in Butz' chair and picked up the phone punching in numbers that made no sense to me. My fingers just clicked them in sequence on their own while I wondered at it all. I didn't fight it though or try to figure it out. I just went with it. It made sense in some way when nothing else had made sense at all since I'd woken up.

I heard the ringing on the other end and thought…come on…come on…let him be there, let him pick up the phone and tell me…and I would know what to do if I just heard his voice. But then I heard footsteps which sounded like the clicking of boots approach the door and I froze my hand still on the phone. I didn't know what to do but when I heard the lock click, I knew it had to be Butz. If he got inside her, I'd never be able to get away from him…to stop him from getting what he wanted…if someone on the phone could help…but I put it down.

The door opened and I braced myself waiting for it to be Butz…for him to tell me to give him what he wanted from me and I tried to figure out how I'd live through it. But I wanted to live…and I knew if it was between life and death…I wanted to live if only to find out who I was and about the people that I sensed might be looking for me.

But when the figure appeared inside the door, I knew it wasn't Butz at all.

Piser:

I walked in Butz' office expecting to see that sorry son of a bitch of a partner of mine sitting there waiting for me…I knew I had to remind him who was in charge of our…business enterprise. It wasn't some stinking sheriff in a backwater town out in the desert that no one cared about, it was me the head of the parole board at the Capitol.

He'd told me on the phone that what happened at the last party at my ranch would never happen again, that what's her name, the blond chick in the Daisy Dukes who tried to run off…was the exception…an aberration and not the rule. I had hated the lot of women he'd paraded in front of me wearing those skintight bikinis that showed off enough to know that they were bottom of the food chain when it came to being quality pieces of ass. I had promised the politicos at the Capitol, the ones who could be bought and sold as easily as these girls that this party coming up today would be the best one yet. Better looking pieces of tail and girls who knew how to give a man what he wanted and show him a good time.

As part of our deal I had first pick of the litter when it came to girls but all I'd seen lately was a bunch of sorry looking runts…all girls who had looked strung out and in a different place. That worked for some of these men who just wanted girls who spread their legs without a word let alone conversation but that didn't work for me.

Butz had promised me a better pick but hadn't delivered no matter how much I told him to pick up better girls.

I was thinking that when I saw her sitting in his chair. It couldn't be one of the girls who filled the jails because what would she be doing here without him? But then I remembered the door had been locked so he must have had her in here…so she must be one of the latest pickups. She looked at me, her wavy brown hair like mahogany spilled around her face, her body curved in the places I liked and her eyes…they looked alert and yet expressionless.

"Hi there…"

She just stared at me as if she belonged there and I didn't.

"I couldn't imagine why the sheriff would leave a pretty young thing like you in here by yourself."

She just shrugged slightly, not warming up to my flattery.

"I wouldn't know…I'm new here," she said, "He had to deal with some trouble in the yard."

I nodded.

"I heard some yelling when I came inside here," he said, "So what you in here for?"

She just stood up and walked away from the desk backwards while keeping her eyes on me. I saw the wariness in her eyes but I was good at charming women into doing just about anything I wanted them to do.

"I don't know…"

"What's your name sweetheart?"

She furrowed her brow as if thinking about it. It hadn't been but the most basic of all questions. Nothing really to think about unless…she'd made one up of course.

"They call me Bunny…"

I smiled widely pouring on the charm. I knew that I had to get my hands on this piece. But why had Butz not told me about her…did he honestly think he'd be able to hide a pretty number like this and keep her for himself? I'd have to have a talk with him about that…before I took her for myself.

"That's a very nice name…"

But then I heard footsteps and Butz walked right in and looked at me…then at her.

"I didn't expect you so soon Piser…I've been busy getting the girls ready for the party."

I cast him a sharp glance.

"I can see that Piser…what did you think you were going to do? Keep this pretty young thing for yourself?"

Butz shook his head. He then had Romart come in the room and told him to take the pretty young thing back to her cell. I watched her go knowing I had to have her. I had kept my eyes on Bunny but she watched both of us very carefully, every movement we made and whatever we said right up to the moment she left the room. Then Butz turned towards me all seriousness now that we were talking business.

"No plans to do that…I know the deal. I would never keep a woman from you. It's just that she just came in and she's not ready yet."

"I think I just found my date for the party."

I knew Butz didn't like that at all from the expression on his face.

"Now I wouldn't advise that Piser…I haven't finished with her…orientation. She's pretty wild right now…I don't know if I can handle her…"

I smiled broadly.

"Now just get her at that party and leave that part of it up to me," I said, "Sometimes it's more fun that way."

I knew I was up to the challenge of breaking any young filly into saddle on my ranch and that went for the two legged variety. I could handle Bunny and I began to think that I might just have my own plans for her.

Butz nodded, not liking it but he didn't need me to remind him why he had no choice in the matter.

Matt:

I finished my burger and fries at the bar where I'd stopped to ask about C.J. I'd been hungry enough to eat but I felt the hairs on the back of my neck prickle when I walked in there. I don't know why that happened but I knew to trust it. I felt like she'd been in here at some point earlier…maybe hours, maybe the previous day not long after she crashed her car.

But the man tending bar just took my order, served my food and then went back to cleaning glasses at the bar. Not inviting much in the way of conversation but keeping one eye on me. I knew he wasn't to be trusted…but not much I could do based just on that. I'd have to ask around in this town to see if anyone had seen C.J.

I called Chris to check in and she'd told me that no one had reported C.J. in a hospital or morgue or any place like that and I exhaled in relief. I didn't know how much I'd been holding my breath during these check in calls until Chris gave me the news that there was no news. As frustrated as I felt, I knew that at least she was out there somewhere…alive…maybe hurt but I'd find her. I'd never stop looking for her until I found her again. All I could think about was what must have happened to her…if I had just flown out here earlier instead of waiting so long…my gut had been telling me that when she didn't call to check in….something must have happened.

"You need a refill on the soda?"

I looked up at the bartender who had a towel draped over a shoulder. I shook my head and asked for the check. It was time to move on and keep on looking…still I couldn't drop this feeling…sensation that I had in the pit of my stomach that I was missing something here. It stuck with me while I left the bar and went out to get back in the rental. I'd stick around here see what I could dig up and then move on to the next town.

Yeah that was a plan I thought as I slid behind the steering wheel and started up the engine to get moving. I pulled out of the parking lot and went down the main strip…not knowing at first that two men had gotten inside a truck to follow me.


	10. Chapter 10

C.J. drove with Matt back to the courthouse in downtown Santa Fe to resume her testimony on the stand in the case against Piser. She felt much better than she had when she left the courthouse to go to the hotel suite. Ate some good food, got some rest alongside her favorite guy and she was ready to go…not that it'd be easy. Answering the prosecution's questions was the easier part of her job and once she put that behind her, what would stand between her and getting out of there would be cross-examination by Tex.

She knew he'd be ruthless with her and wrap it around a layer of Texan charm…but she knew how to respond to men like him. After all, she'd survived growing up in Southern Texas alongside men and she'd survived Bannon County too. If he gave her too much of an attitude, she'd toss it back in his face just as nicely. She knew she could do it without breaking a sweat. Other women hadn't been as lucky and had died trying to escape…she had to speak for them and put their killers away.

"It'll be over before you know it C.J."

She glanced over at him smiling.

"I know…I wish it were over now but I know what I got to do and I'm going to do it. It could have ended differently and I know it…I could be dead if I didn't have you in my life and if I were dead…"

But she couldn't finish because her life had changed so much mostly in the past six months or so but she felt that when the prostitution ring had been busted by Matt and the cops she'd been given a second chance. She glanced again at the man next to her and knew she'd put it to good use…the very best as a matter of fact.

"Good…then we'll go get that steak dinner with all the trimmings…and in lieu of wine…"

She pursed her lips.

"There's some sparkling grape juice on the menu," she said, "That'll do…but what about for you?"

"Sounds perfect…things couldn't be more perfect."

She knew that as much as she knew anything else. Life had its wrinkles, its obstacles strewn in one's path but when they were overcome it made a person stronger, and more appreciative of life's many gifts.

She knew only too well how quickly everything could change.

Earlier…

CJ:

I returned to my cell and sat on the bunk waiting for Rhonda to return. I'd heard shouting and then a gunshot while I'd been in Butz' office. What had happened out there? But I'd quickly focused on what I discovered in his desk.

The photos of the women wearing hardly anything compared to the men they posed with in the photographs. My gut, the part of me that acted independently told me to make a phone call, to punch in some number that just popped into my head…in connection with the man. I didn't understand any of it but I obeyed it. Something told me I'd need to do that to survive.

Now I was back in the cell and suddenly I heard the footsteps again. The door opened and Rhonda walked back into it looking irritated. She shot some pithy look back at the deputy as he closed the door and locked it again.

"Don't get too comfortable," Rhonda said, "We've got to get ready to some party later on."

I felt confused.

"Party what party?"

Rhonda made a face.

"I heard about it in the yard…after some loud mouthed bitch tried to pop me one in the chow line…"

I bit my lip.

"I heard a gunshot."

Rhonda waved her hand as if it were nothing.

"Oh that…it was nothing," she said, "Butz just shot off his gun to break us up…no one got hurt."

I sighed rubbing my hands together, my head filled with all kinds of images of what could have happened with Rhonda lying dead in most of them. But she didn't seem all that concerned as she went to look out the window. Maybe it was a part of her life to be in such situations but I didn't know whether that was true of my own…since I knew so little about it.

"They told us before we came back inside that we'll be hitting the showers soon," Rhonda said, "to clean up for the party. It'll probably feel good."

I thought it might feel good to clean up. I didn't remember the last time I'd showered and I felt like I could use it. To get out of these clothes and stand under a shower to get rid of the grime might make some of it go away but not all of it.

Some of the dirtiness I felt couldn't be washed clean. I still felt Butz' hands all over me and his mouth…where it had touched mine. Nothing could possibly be so vile.

I didn't think I'd ever feel clean again.

Suddenly I heard the door open and Romart stood there smirking at us. I looked into his beady eyes and I knew he'd killed before and enjoyed reliving it.

"Get moving girls," he said, "You need to get cleaned up and get that filth off of you…as much as you can."

I just looked at Rhonda.

"I told you to get your asses up and into the showers…time's a wasting…got some powerful big shots waiting for your…talents."

I got up and so did Rhonda and we followed him towards the showers just a few yards away where we saw the other women.

Fran:

I saw the two gringa bitches walk in the showers like they owned the place. They didn't know yet that I was in charge here. The guards might think otherwise but they don't know that Butz and I have an understanding, I control the women locked up with me and he gives me nice things. Not that l like the bastard or any of them but a girl's got to survive right?

Babs and I, we were talking in the chow line when Miss High and Mighty the tall gringa with the red curly hair cut me off…like the slop sitting in bins on the table's worth it. What we don't eat goes to feed some pigs on a farm…that's all it's fit for anyway.

I can't have some brand new bitch brought in by Butz challenge me no how so I got ready to beat her down, tripping her up so she'd fall on the ground and I'd pin her fast like a skewered fish.

Butz and the deputies broke it up like I knew they might…but I was beating her, showing her who ran the place when Butz fired his gun.

A warning shot.

I broke off from her and got on my feet barely broke a sweat and Babs, she just smiled at me. Then Romart and Slim told us we'd cool off in the showers.

Now I watched as the two of them got ready to strip down and get in the showers. I'd hold back and do some recon of my own because I had my suspicions especially about the one who called herself Bunny. What kind of name was that and something about her…I just knew it wasn't like it seemed. Butz had taken a liking to her which meant less love for me. Fine with me as long as we understood each other but I wondered if Bunny was really working for him already. Spying on the rest of us and snitching for him, getting info on what we did and sad then ratting us out for her own good. I knew she'd turn out to be another bitch who thought she'd rule the jail.

If I found out something about her…something I could use…I could stop her before she took my place. So I searched her clothes and that of Rhonda's and suddenly pulled out a piece of paper from one of the pockets.

Matt:

I drove away from the bar to head back out on the highway. I'd stopped to talk to some folks but none of them had anything to say. None of them had seen C.J. during the past couple of days. Damn, where could she be? She couldn't have just dropped off the face of the earth. I knew she'd gotten herself into trouble and that I had to find her.

I looked outside at the scenery and not much to it, just acres and acres of browned out desert occasionally broken up by cacti or tumbleweeds. Old brush and the occasional jack rabbit scampering across the ground…miles of it like I'd told C.J. when she first told me about her planned road trip.

It's been a tough year for her so far to say the least. She'd been shot twice in just a few months, first in the shoulder when we'd tried to escape that building and then later when we'd been ambushed by members of a religious cult. She'd begged me to not take her to the hospital the first time and instead run back into the building to get the evidence that would clear my name. But I couldn't sacrifice her life for my freedom.

The second time, she'd been awake part of the time, in agony while all I could do was watch as a medical student tried to treat her. By the time we got her to a hospital, she'd barely been alive and I felt her slipping away. This time I begged her not to leave me…I don't know if I'd ever been so scared in my whole life.

In between getting shot up had been Robert Tyler and that hurt as much as a bullet to the heart in other ways. I knew that just by looking at her when I had to do the most difficult task of telling her that  
Robert was a liar and a fraud…and would soon be a murderer.

I thought that was it, I thought I'd lost her forever when she told me she'd resign from Houston Enterprises. But I couldn't back down from what I said…she had to know the truth no matter how much it hurt. It had hurt me too to see the pain on her face, the anger at me and the indecision because she knew that some fundamental part of herself knew I'd never deliberately hurt her.

The night that we'd been apart had been one of the longest but she'd returned next day and as I embraced her, life felt like normal again. But even as she wanted to help me and Roy set up Robert for the kill, I knew the toll it'd taken on her.

She'd been running on empty for a while now and I knew that she had wanted to take this road trip to spend time on her own, to think about what had happened and figure it all out.

I'd been here myself. But what I wanted right now more than anything was to find her, to see her again safe and sound, to wrap my arms around her and hold her close.

First I had to find her and I had no leads…then I looked in his rearview mirror and saw a pickup truck trailing him. I'd seen it earlier, a couple miles ago and it was still on my tail. I thought I saw two men inside of it.

Then I heard the truck accelerate as it rammed the back of the car.


End file.
